Mark Me
by fbeauchamphartz
Summary: In a society where the initials of the person you fall in love with show up on your wrist - Sebastian finds Kurt tending bar in Brooklyn, nearly unrecognizable. Apparently nursing a broken heart, Sebastian makes it his mission to try and get Kurt into bed, but he refuses to give in. After six months of Fridays and a devastating text message, can Sebastian finally change his mind?


**A/N:** _Written for the Kurtbastian Hiatus Project prompt 'au of choice'. I chose 'marking'. Based on a post I read that I can't seem to find (which asked the question what if when you fall in love a red tally mark shows up on your wrist…) In this au, similar rules apply, except the initials of the person you fall in love with show up in red on your wrist. FutureFic, skank!Kurt. Warning for alcohol, language, mention of sex, mention of Klaine/Blaine. Not Blaine friendly._

The life of a bartender is not all that exciting, but it pays pretty well when you factor in tips, and it allows for a certain level of anonymity. There are few surprises. Most drinks during the course of the evening are relatively the same - rum and coke, a shot or seven of tequila, a black Russian, a white Russian, the obligatory Sex on the Beach from the sorority girls - all with about twelve dozen beers thrown in here and there.

It's when he gets to one order in particular that Kurt knows his peaceful night is over.

"My god, Smythe," Kurt groans, pouring Sebastian his pale ale and Courvoisier chaser – his regular Friday night fare, "don't I get one night off from you?"

"Never," Sebastian says, taking his drink before Kurt can pour it in his lap. "I never get tired of your company."

"Really," Kurt says with an unimpressed eye roll as he serves up a Budweiser to a guy impatiently tapping his fingers on the bar.

"Of course," Sebastian says, taking a sip of his beer. "I love this look you've got going for you tonight, by the way – the leather vest sans shirt, the spiked bracelets, the lime green hair…" Sebastian boosts himself up on the rungs on his barstool to peek over the bar for a better look at Kurt's ensemble, "the stereotypical tight black jeans with the strategic rips and tears. Yup. You get trashier and trashier every time I see you."

"Fuck you, Sebastian," Kurt says. It's become his default response to every comment Sebastian makes so it carries very little weight with it anymore.

"That's what I've been trying to get you to do for months now, Hummel," Sebastian says with a laugh. "You're just not smart enough to say _yes_ yet."

"Yeah, well, you don't have that kind of luck," Kurt replies with a sneer, moving down the bar to serve more drinks.

Sebastian drinks his beer and waits for Kurt to come back round his way.

For all of his blustering, Kurt always comes back. It didn't used to be that way. The first few Friday nights after Sebastian found Kurt working at Canal Bar, Kurt would take his break the minute he saw Sebastian walk in, peeking out from the back on occasion to make sure he'd gone before Kurt went back to work. But Sebastian was persistent. He didn't leave the bar for hours and Kurt couldn't hide forever - not if he wanted to make a paycheck. It was all fun and games – getting his jollies watching Kurt freak out, like they were back in high school – until it became a routine. One that felt comfortable. One that Sebastian had come to look forward to.

He doesn't have too many of those in his life.

Sebastian doesn't know the whole story yet behind why Kurt is stuck tending bar at this dive in Brooklyn, but he was getting the details little by little.

Kurt had moved to New York after high school to go to NYADA and be with Blaine – his supposed one true love - the boy whose initials had shown up on Kurt's wrist in a glowing shade of cardinal red one day, the same time Kurt's initials had shown up on Blaine's wrist in the same exact shade. That's the way love proclaimed itself to the world – through bright flaming red initials on your wrist the second you fell in love.

But if that love isn't returned, it goes stale, or it dies, the initials turn black, staining your skin forever like a morbid scar, reminding you every day of something you had that you lost. There is no way of removing them, no way of tattooing over them. They are permanent – a cruel, sick joke of the universe on the puny mortals that inhabit the earth.

Lovers' initials didn't always show up in pairs like theirs did. In fact, it was kind of rare so people thought it was kismet – that Kurt and Blaine were truly meant to be.

One of the first things Sebastian had noticed about Kurt the first time he saw him – besides his radical punk-rock-Sid-Vicious makeover – was that Blaine's initials on Kurt's wrist had morphed into a horrible, ink black mark.

At the time, Sebastian saw it more as an opportunity than anything else.

He'd be ashamed to admit that now.

"Come on, Hummel," Sebastian says without the teasing tone. "What the hell are you holding out for?"

Kurt scoffs, pulling out a glass to make a whiskey sour.

"You mean besides the fact that you're obnoxiously irritating and a complete and total asshole?" Kurt asks, sliding the finished drink down the bar.

"Well, obviously aside from all of that," Sebastian drawls, and Kurt almost laughs. Kurt picks up a rag and occupies himself with wiping down the bar.

"We're…working out our differences," Kurt answers. Sebastian blows out a breath and sits back on the stool, gripping the bar so as not to fall over. He's heard that _working out our differences_ tripe before. It's some kind of cryptic code that means that Blaine called or texted, once again stringing Kurt along.

And it amazes Sebastian exactly how much that's beginning to piss him off.

"Yeah," Sebastian says, "and how is that working out?"

Sebastian expects Kurt to blow up at him, to bare his teeth and hiss some sort of vulgar insult unworthy of the Kurt Hummel that Sebastian remembers, but to his surprise, Kurt just stops his cleaning and stares at his reflection in the polished wood.

"You know, if I took you home I'd only be using you," Kurt admits quietly.

"I never said that was a bad thing," Sebastian replies, draining his glass and tapping it on the bar, asking for another. Kurt smirks.

"You know the rules. You have to finish your shot first before I can get you another beer," Kurt reminds him.

"I've never been a big fan of rules," Sebastian says, sipping the shot quickly, letting the alcohol warm his tongue as a way to stall and think of a more compelling argument to get Kurt into bed. What is there left that he hasn't tried?

When I first started coming here, it was to torment the shit out of you, but now I know I've fallen for you?

Do you think I've come in here every Friday night for the last six months to buy a pale ale I can get a block from my penthouse?

Ditch gel helmet once and for all and give dating me a try?

The truth is never going to get him laid, and that's what he's looking for since he's sure that's all Kurt would be willing to offer.

"So, who are _you_ trying to fuck away?" Kurt asks, hoping that Sebastian's persistence doesn't stem from anything so cliché as genuine affection. Kurt doesn't know if he could handle that right now, especially not from Sebastian. Though it's interesting how a couple of years and a brand new city can change a person. When he first saw Sebastian again, right after his break with Blaine (break, not break-up, since they are not officially done dragging their relationship through the mud just yet – black initials be damned), his impulse was to grab his jacket and run far and fast in any direction. As it was, he spent most of his time hiding to absolutely no avail. But now Sebastian's become a fixture in his weekend schedule, and to date, he's never missed a Friday night.

That has to count for something…doesn't it?

"Sadly, I'm not afflicted with such a predicament," Sebastian says, raising his glass of pale ale in a silent toast. "I'm just looking to get laid."

"And why me?" Kurt asks jokingly to hide the sincerity of his question.

"Because you happen to have the hottest ass in New York." Sebastian lifts his drink to his lips and gulps it down.

"Well, you're out of luck, Smythe," Kurt says, not entirely displeased with Sebastian's comeback, "because tonight I have a date."

"I know," Sebastian says after a gulp. "I'm right here. I'm glad we both agree."

"Not you," Kurt laughs, reaching into his pocket and pulling out his vibrating cell phone. "Speak of the devil…" Kurt looks down at his screen, biting his lower lip as a smile teases across his lips. Sebastian watches the smile grow along with a hard pit in his chest. _He_ wants to put that smile there, not the asshole that Sebastian is sure has texted Kurt right now.

Sebastian can hear the moment when Kurt stops breathing.

A second later, his smile fades away as if it had never even existed.

Kurt slams his phone on the bar and then shoves it in his pocket. He looks up at Sebastian with watery eyes.

"It looks like tonight's your lucky night, Smythe," he says, brushing a loose tear from his cheek.

Sebastian sits up straight, not too sure this is the way he wanted to win out.

But he'll take what he can get.

"Do I get to know…"

"Do you need to know?" Kurt counters before Sebastian can finish his question.

Sebastian stares into Kurt's eyes – eyes that are pleading for Sebastian to stop asking questions and help him forget.

"No," Sebastian says. "Not at all."

* * *

><p>Kurt splashes water on his face, running wet fingers through his stiff hair, rinsing the sleep from his eyes. The night had been a blur. No, not a blur - a whirlwind.<p>

Benjamin, Kurt's boss, had let Kurt off from work early. He understood Kurt's personal life issues almost as well as Sebastian – which is to say that he knew only what he needed to know. Kurt had dragged Sebastian home and straight into bed. Kurt tried to make their interaction clinical. It was lay - only about physical pleasure and release. It disheartened Kurt for a second to realize that after Sebastian got what he was after for so long that he'd probably find a new bar to haunt and a new conquest to chase after, but maybe that was the best.

Kurt needed to start heeding some long bided good advice from his friend Ms. Mercedes Jones.

Kurt Hummel is a diva, and sometimes divas need to be alone.

Alone is definitely what he was now that Blaine had sent him his last text message to let him now that instead of working out their problems he'd decided to move in with his brand-spanking-new boyfriend.

He had given Kurt the brush off and via text message, no less. He didn't even have the balls to tell Kurt to his face.

Prick.

Then there is Sebastian, who kissed him last night like he's been waiting for years to kiss Kurt, who undressed him slowly, who every time Kurt tried to speed things up and make them meaningless – took Kurt's wrists in his hands and brought him back.

What they had done the night before wasn't just sex. It was bordering on something more – something Kurt could recognize but that he didn't want to give a name to.

This was supposed to be one time only.

When he looked down at Sebastian, he wanted to see Blaine – or anyone else for that matter.

But what he saw were dozens of drinks, bickering, bantering, arguments that turned into conversations – what movie Kurt saw last week, the amazing ceviche Sebastian had for lunch, some fugly bitch that expected a casting couch audition at Kurt's latest cattle call, and more than their fair shares of _do you remember when…?_

It was nice feeling a connection with another human being again.

It hadn't even felt like that with Blaine for a long time.

That was probably the first clue Kurt had that it was over, but he liked the lie so much.

Kurt shakes his head and keeps splashing water on his face. Why was it so hard for him to wake up? He hadn't had a thing to drink the night before. He wanted to stay sober. He didn't want to fall headlong into drunken infatuation with a man who couldn't even keep a boyfriend.

Needless to say, there were no initials anywhere on Sebastian Smythe's wrists.

It's not until the fourth splash of ice cold water pricks his skin and stings his eyes that he sees it – the red initials beside the black ones on his wrist.

Two red 'S's, twined together like mating snakes, clear as broad daylight.

"No," Kurt says, staring at them, running them under the water and trying to rub them off with his thumb. "No, no, no, hell no!"

Kurt feels his racing heart stutter sickly between beats, like a hiccup when you're vomiting.

"Oh, God." He pulls his hands down his face, his fingertips scraping the skin. "Oh God, oh God, oh God…" he moans, racing back into his bedroom to where Sebastian lay asleep on his belly with a goofy grin on his face. Kurt didn't want this. It couldn't be true. How did the universe, or genetics, or _whatever_ think that he could be in love with Sebastian Smythe? At least if Sebastian doesn't have a mark, too, then Kurt could get out of this unscathed. He would just invest in a grip of Kat Von D cover-up and forget that this ever happened.

Kurt turns over Sebastian's wrists – first the left, then the right.

Nothing.

Kurt sighs. Then, as an afterthought, he lifts up the comforter and examines Sebastian's entire body, flipping him over to check down his front.

"Wha-what's going on?" Sebastian giggles, lifting his left hand to rub his eyes, scrubbing down his face with his whole hand. "Did you want to go again, sweetheart?" Sebastian's arm drops to the mattress and a second later he snores loudly through his nose, immediately back to sleep.

Kurt runs his hands over his face and into his hair, taming the drying strands so they don't frizz up and stand out all over the place. He looks at the mark on his wrist and sighs.

"What a fucked up mess," he mumbles, crossing his arms over his chest to hide it – from himself, from Sebastian…from himself. He picks up Sebastian's arm and looks down at his clear, overturned wrist, running a wet finger over it. He feels something thick and gummy come up on his finger. He turns his finger over. Whatever the gunk is, it's flesh colored. Kurt looks down at Sebastian's wrist and sees just a touch, a shadow, the tiniest hint of red. Kurt narrows his eyes and rubs the spot with his finger over and over until the gunk (which Kurt realizes is concealer) comes off revealing a set of initials underneath – _KH_.

Kurt's poor, overworked heart comes to a complete stop in his chest.

When he looks over at Sebastian's sleeping face, hooded green eyes stare back at him.

Kurt's face loses all color. His mind is a complete blank. There are a million and one questions he wants to ask but never will because he can barely breathe.

"Sebastian?" is the only thing he can manage to say.

Sebastian swallows, but he doesn't pull his arm away.

"I can explain."


End file.
